


the end of everything

by quietlyintoemptyspaces



Series: backstory [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Asexuality, Backstory, Drug Use, Gen, Implied Underage, Self-Harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-15
Updated: 2013-05-15
Packaged: 2017-12-12 00:03:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/804794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quietlyintoemptyspaces/pseuds/quietlyintoemptyspaces
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>His last detox is at twenty-five.</p><p>Sally Donovan watches him the entire time.</p><p>She still calls him Freak.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the end of everything

Sherlock is three years old when he sees cracked bone breaking through torn flesh; it’s the first thing he files away in his mind palace, along with the look of terror and pain on Mycroft’s face as he calls out for Mummy. He won’t get in trouble this time, but as soon as he’s drugged and his arm is in a cast he’ll get that look of disappointment and the short tut-tut of disapproval even though everyone knows that as soon as he’s healed he’ll be right up that tree again.

As Mummy carries Mycroft away Sherlock stands at the base and stares into the branches at his little red kite, the one his brother had tried to rescue for him. He steps on a root and tries to climb up but the bark breaks beneath his fingers and the first branch is too high for him to reach. He keeps trying until Mummy’s private doctor drives up and then he goes inside to watch Mycroft’s splintered bones be reset.

The nanny keeps him out of the room though so he can only hear the doctor telling Mycroft it’s okay, everything’s alright, you’re doing great. 

Sherlock wants to see though, so he knows, knows what his face is supposed to look like, how many tears he’s supposed to cry, how he’s supposed to hold his arm, if he’s supposed to cry out for Mummy and cling to Mycroft.

Later that night, Sherlock watches Mycroft flip through the psychology books, the ones that tell him how to create the mind palace and how to store things. Sherlock knows what he’s looking for, some way to remove this horrible day from his memory, but he also knows he won’t.

-

When Sherlock is ten, Mycroft is seventeen and away at school. He stares at the base of the tree, like he has each year since, and looks at the torn kite that is still trapped by branches. Sherlock is tall enough now to reach the bottom branch and the ascent from that point is only too easy; he passes the kite, decides that he’ll get it on the way down. It’s further than Mycroft got.

Sherlock climbs halfway up the tree before he stops to look down. The ground looks distant, so far away, and it makes him sway. He doesn’t try to hang on.

When he hits the ground, the broken kite registers before the pain does, but that’s only because part of it is sticking into his shoulder. Sherlock thinks back to the time Mycroft did this and thinks that he should probably be calling for help or crying but his voice is gone and his tears refuse to come.

The nanny meets him at the door and then shouts for Mummy and then calls the doctor.

Sherlock gets scolded. He doesn’t get a cast or stitches.

It’s a wholly dissatisfying experience.

No broken bones; how disappointing.

-

Sherlock is twelve when Mycroft announces that he’s going to be Queen one day. It takes an hour of explanation to clarify that no, not actually the Queen, but he will have that kind of power someday. Mummy gushes out her praise and then they both turn to Sherlock as though waiting for a similar exclamation.

Just before he finishes his tea, he decides, “I’m going to be the Doctor.”

Mycroft smiles as him, but Sherlock can’t be sure he understands. Mummy frowns and the next day there are no more television sets in the house.

The nanny sighs at that and starts bringing her books.

Sherlock works in peace.

-

The first time Sherlock realizes that he might not be like everybody else is when he’s sixteen and the woman two doors down from his kisses him and tries to take him to bed. In the moment it takes to catch his breath to tell her that no, he can take himself to bed she’s already started working on his belt and tugging at his trousers.

“I don’t usually do this,” she explains, grinning up at him with smeared lipstick that makes Sherlock frown. “But you helped me out. And you’re really cute.”

She’s also married and three months pregnant. When she asks why he’s not into it, he answers as honestly as possible: “I’m not attracted.”

She stops, covers her mouth, widens her eyes, and says, “Oh. Oh. I didn’t even think… Of course you’re gay.”

Sherlock doesn’t correct her, but two days later it happens again. This time it’s a guy. The results are the same.

There is no need to repeat the experience.

-

Reviewing his mind palace at eighteen, Sherlock draws the memory of Mycroft’s broken bones from beneath the bed at his childhood home. He compares it to the memory on the bookshelf that was stored exactly seven years later and frowns. Mycroft always gets results, even when he’s not looking for them.

Sherlock has never broken a bone; he wants a memory that’s comparable to Mycroft’s.

He has safety glasses taken from the chemistry lab, scalpels stolen from the hospital a couple years ago, and an anatomy book borrowed from the library.

It takes two tries before he gets deep enough to hit bone, and then he has to avoid veins and tendons. His table is a red, wet mess and his vision dims even as he pulls aside muscles and touches a fingertip to his radius.

He wants to see it broken.

They call Mycroft at the hospital and Sherlock says it’s never going to happen again.

-

The next time, he breaks a knuckle when he slams the door on it.

He tells the doctor it was an accident.

Mycroft knows better.

-

At nineteen, Sherlock’s mind races at the feel of a new drug in his bloodstream. His brain swims, his stomach floats, and his body thrums. Three hours later he sits with his head pressed against the porcelain bowl of the toilet and peels the nicotine patch off of his forearm.

The first attempt at finding an adequate stimulant is a failure.

Marijuana is a fairly common substance, but it dulls his senses.

Caffeine only goes so far.

Cocaine, he finds, makes the world around him spin as fast as his mind works, even if the people slow down.

The people don’t matter, though. Finally there is something to take him from the boring tedium of the mundane workings of everyday life.

He doesn’t have to suffer through average anymore.

-

Sherlock is twenty when he goes through his first detox, left in a cold room with only his brother’s disappointed face to stare at.

The floor feels good against his skin.

-

Detective Lestrade tells him he needs to be clean if he’s going to be working with the police.

Sherlock is twenty-three and this time the only face to stare at as the drugs leave his system is his own. He breaks the mirror with a shaking fist and dry heaves over the sink.

At least he’s not bored.

-

Sally Donovan is newly transferred and follows the evidence even if she doesn’t see all of it. Sherlock would probably compliment her were he anyone else.

Freak is a term of endearment if he’s ever heard one; he’d be offended is she decided to call him Normal.

-

His last detox is at twenty-five.

Sally Donovan watches him the entire time.

She still calls him Freak.

-

Sherlock meets Dr. Mike Stamford at twenty-eight. In the first glance he can tell everything the man has done and everything he’s going to do. He’s completely unremarkable, but he has his uses.

He uses one of the hospital’s laboratories and texts answers to Lestrade from Mike’s phone. However, trying to get into St. Bartholomew’s morgue and finding ways to use the bodies there for his own purposes is surprisingly difficult.

Much to Sherlock’s grand displeasure, Mycroft does quite well at finding him various body parts to experiment on and observe.

Sharing the results, of course, more than makes up for it.

-

When he’s thirty-one Mrs. Hudson’s hires him to put her husband away. And make him stay there. Sherlock doesn’t know what the guy did, but he’s only too happy to do it.

-

At thirty-two he meets an extremely shy woman working in the morgue. Molly Hooper, newly hired and easily manipulated.

He can practically smell the pheromones coming off of her and it’s extremely tedious constantly commenting on her appearance but at least now he has unlimited access to the morgue.

-

At thirty-three he moves into the flat that Mrs. Hudson offers him. It has two bedrooms and is reasonably priced. He suspects that Mrs. Hudson would probably let him live there for free and still fuss over him like he was her son.

Plus, she puts up with his eccentricities, even if she does call them a mess.

-

At age thirty-three, Sherlock Holmes meets John Watson.

Initially, he suspects John won’t stay, despite the fact that he is a man of action and Sherlock brings action and adventure with him wherever he goes. Except, of course, for those times between when he laments to the skull that Mrs. Hudson repeatedly takes and other times when he tries to find some way to ease the stagnation away from his mind.

John stays.

He stays through murder, through drug busts and boredom and kidnapping. He stays even through body parts in the fridge and experiments gone wrong and experiments gone right.

Through it all, John stays.

Mycroft is the only other person in Sherlock’s life that has stayed. Somehow, the fact that John isn’t related to him makes it different.

Someday, he knows John will leave. If he doesn’t, perhaps Sherlock will.


End file.
